WARHAMMER 40,000: A Thousand Tiny Suns (40k/Exalted Crossover!)

The first three days aboard ship, you stayed in your cabin. Kit left, to explore, and he came back with amazing stories.

Rooms the size of entire hab blocks, full of space marines in prayer. Chapter serfs by the dozen, bowed and moving about their shifts. Machines that he had never seen before, cracking and humming. Space Marines who seemed to be almost a member of the Adeptus Mechanicus - with mechadendrites and similar levels of clerical knowledge. It was painfully clear what he wanted, you could smell it through the mask.

Come on, 41. Look out there and see what there is to see.

Finally, though, Kit hit on it.

"I ran into Amberly and she was wondering if you'd ever use the training rooms," Kit was saying, casually, as he returned to the room to find you praying at the shrine of the Emperor that the Ultramarines had been polite enough to give you.
The next day, you started out of the room. It wasn't like you'd let Amberly of all people think you were shy.

And it was just as you had feared.

You went out in your most humble rig - blue jacket, red pants, the most unadorned mask you had, and without any medals or badges. You looked for all the world like what you were. A simple Krieger, walking purposefully towards the practice rooms. And yet, the first two marines that you ran into - both of them clad in the simple robes the Ultramarines preferred when not wearing their powerful armor - both started as they saw you and immediately gave you their leg. You held up your hands, stammering. "P-Please don't," you said.

"Honorable one, it is a delight to meet you," one said, his nut brown skin gleaming as he dipped his head. His voice was remarkably light and high, almost airy.

"Likewise," the other said - he had a bright shock of brilliant blond hair. Though, thankfully, both rose from their knee. "I am Brother William - this is Brother Cadwell."

"Uh...I'm...41-22..." you said, ducking your head forward.

"We've heard a great many remarkable things about you, young Krieger," Brother William said, his voice as deep and rumbling as all space marines you'd met so far, save for Brother Cadwell, of course. "And I'm sure you're quite sick of hearing this, but we hold the Kreiger in high regard."

"We're really not worth all this," you said, shame burning behind your mask.

"Nonsense," Brother Cadwell said, his voice suited to the warm smile he gave you. "No people give of themselves so gladly, nor with so little thought as the folk of Krieg. It is the least that we can do to honor you, as befits your sacrifice."

"Please, Cadwell," Brother William said, gently. "Can't you see you're embarrassing her?" This gentle advice, of course, left her even more embarrassed.

"My apologies, honorable one," Cadwell said, chuckling. "We get to interact so little with others not of our clade. I did not mean to cause offense."

"N-No...None taken!" you stammered. "I...you can...whatever! Ask me anything you wish. I am your servant! An open book!"

"Ah, delightful," Brother William said. "But, first, do you require any breaking of your fast? It is almost the hour of terce, we normally break our fast then in the refectory - though, sorry to say, many of my brothers are a mite antisocial until they've had their kaff and prefer to take their meals in their quarters or in private study halls."

"T-There's enough room for that kind of thing?" you asked, a bit curious.

"Well, this ship is made to carry a quarter of a Legion," Cadwell said, his voice dry. Your brain pinged with that. "It's always had more room than it should have."

Men in crude armor, rapidly produced. Hammered into shape and crammed onto their bodies. Some still have cancers from the hurried implantation. One vomits in his helmet mic. The whole Thunderhawk trembles and shakes as Interex infared beamers lance through the sky. Evasive fire causes ablative armor to boil off into steam.

You shook your head, the memory flash leaving you...discombobulated.

"Well, uh, I am a little hungry," you admitted. "I can go a few days without eating."

The two nodded.

As your small party of three made their way through the ship, Cadwell asked, in that cheerful way of his: "So, are you married to that young Cadian with the purple eyes?"

Fortunately, before you could say anything, your eyes fell on a trio of heavily burdened chapter serfs. They were clad in the gear of a techwight, with the heavy collections of seals and scrolls, wrenches, measuring tape, nail bags, magnetic seals, fuse-clamps, isolinear processors, syntactic neuronal clumps, containers full of black bile, yellow humors, and adhesive sticks, all required to do the onerous tasks of keeping ancient, cantankerous machinery from wheezing to death. A servitor entombed in the wall was writhing slightly, hissing and gurgling as you stepped away from Cadwell and William with a quick. "One moment!"

You snatched up a bottle of black bile, two adhesives sticks, the bag of nails, and five purity seal scrolls. You tossed off a quick. "Sorry, just-"

Your palm glowed with a shimmering skein of golden essence. You slappy your hand along the scroll and wax, dragging up some bile, your other hand flicking out. Nails slammed into place as, in a blur, you put together a seal over one of the malfunctioning machines, easing it. You stepped to the next and next and next, your brow glowing brilliantly with your Twilight caste mark. Once your hands were empty, you walked past the stunned chapel serfs and to the two towering space marines, who were both gaping in shock at the completely repaired corridor.

"Done!" you said, panting slightly. "Um. So. What were we saying? Right, uh, the breakfast!"

On the fifth day, Kit found you. It wasn't that you had been avoiding him. Far from it. You and he had slept together every night. And gone out every day, with a table set aside for you at the refectory, with food to eat, water to drink, and battle brothers to talk too. You had heard many a fascinating story about distant worlds and strange adventures - it seemed that while space marines got involved in a great many wars, far more wars involved a lot more walking, paperwork, and talking to strange human cultures than you'd have thought.

But no.

On the fifth day, Kit found you because you had found the annoying room.

It was on the prow of the battle barge, and it was the size of a small cathedral. While the massive barrels of the macrocannonry that was used to fire shells at enemy ships had been retracted for the warp trip, there were still hundreds upon hundreds of chapel serfs, their robes cast aside to reveal ropy muscle, tattoos and augmentations, all gleaming and glittering with sweat as they worked in masses, shouting work songs. They were practicing the loading of the immense guns.

And it...

Annoyed you.

Kit turned from a small kitten to his muscular self, grinning. "41-22, have you missed lunch and dinner because you're watching sweaty naked muscle men?"

"This room is stupid!" You exclaimed, springing to your feet.

"It's...a macrocannon, honey," Kit said, sounding amused. "How else should it work?"

"There should be a machine that moves those shells - everyone being run on muscle power is stupid, we have a fusion drive!" You started to stomp around, rubbing your chin, then scowled.

"No one knows how to make that kind of sorcery, not anymore," Kit said, his voice gentle.

You frowned harder.

Kit...

Kit was very kind.

He let you stay in your room, muttering and scribbling notes and chewing on your knuckles, and grumbling under your breath for a solid three days before he finally pulled you out and forced you to eat and drink some water. But with the food in you, you were unstoppable.

The men were doing their practice on the macrocannon loading, shouting and hollaring to one another. You walked around the edge of the room, mostly unnoticed, until you found the long forgotten piece of machinery you were looking for. The first attempt let loose a loud squeal that caused several men to cry out in alarm. You had picked the time between hefting one shell and the next, so no one let go of any immense weights, fortunately. You spoke into the handheld transmitter and your voice boomed from the laud hailers.

"Leave the room immediately," you said, firmly.

Leave the room immediately. Your brow furrowed. There was an inner voice, crawling up and out of the back of your brain - one that expected to be obeyed. The serfs looked around, wildly, and then one of them dressed in the high crested robes that you recognized as being a serf watch leader advanced towards you.

"You, I-" he drew up short, then scowled. "What is a little vatborn landling doing here with the terminix laudhailer!?"

"This room is stupid," you said, unable to stop the voice in your mind from becoming the voice on your tongue. "It's big enough and has access to enough power to run motive force through hydraulic and pneumatic lifting machinery, the whole thing could be reloaded by five men on terminals, and you have five hundred sweating away, getting themselves injured and killed, to fire the gun every thirty minutes when we could be firing it every Emperor by damned five minuets!" You thrust the speaker into the box, advancing on the serf leader. "Do you understand how wasteful that is! For the price of zero point nought nought nought nought...nought two percent of the whole shield array, you could sextuple the firepower of the ship WHILE ALSO freeing this ENTIRE room to...do...do literally anything else! Anything at all!" Your arms spread wide. "Leave! Now! Immediately! I have to FIX this!"

The serfs had gathered around you and were gaping at you, all of them shocked.

"She's left leave of her senses," someone whispered.

"All right, landling, lets call up a Battle Brother..." The serf leader said, turning to face one of his fellows. "And they'll-"

"Fine!" You threw up your hands, then grabbed onto your great coat.

With a single flick of your arm, you sent it flying away from your shoulders, the whole length of it crashing into one of the stunned serf's chests. He caught it, stumbling backwards.

You wore a tank top, your arms exposed to the bright lumens, with your mask still covering your face. But your anima was what had them all gaping. A golden halo of crackling flames, sweeping around your body as your caste mark blazed through the rubber and leather of your mask, while losing the great coat had tugged your ponytail free, causing your curtain of brilliant red hair to tumble free in a spreading arc. The vast interlocking gears and the thunder of hooves both rang around you as you lifted your head, then sprang up, landing on the shoulder of the shocked serf leader. You leaped from shoulder to shoulder to finally land at the base of the huge crane that served as the pully.

"We'll start with this!" you said, then started to grab components from the walls, ripping steel and bending apart adamant with your fingers. A glowing hammer of pure essence appeared in your hand and you started to beat the machinery into new shapes. Smoke steamed from your mask's filter, and your body flickered and flared brightly as the serfs sprinted away, screaming in alarm.

"Daemon! Daemon!"

In a few short moments, several Battle Brothers had arrived, wearing their full kit, holding their bolters. Captain Brutus led them - but he held up his hand. "What are you doing!?" He called out.

You had completed the first half of the crane.

"Working!" you called over your shoulder.

You ignored them, and ignored it when Kit and Amberly, and one of the tech-marines came. The tech-marine watched...and then cried out, turning to face his fellows. They all spoke in hushed voices as you sprinted past them - then returned, your arms straining as you carried huge loads of scrap metal and replacement parts from the holds. While working on a project, it felt like your whole body was surging with energy, and you could work without break. Sweat beaded along your skin as you sprinted from place to place in the room, hammering, forging. Kit slipped into your dance of creation - and forced you to lift your mask enough to reveal parched lips. He poured water down your mouth, then...stole a kiss...

You hesitated for an eternity.

A solid...five, six seconds.

Then you were back to work. And by now, the serfs had been coaxed to return, and you found many helping hands waiting to carry, to fetch. Scaffolding rose as you snatched a catnap - and dreamed of actuators, gravshafts and tygers, burning brilliant bright as you chased after them, through an endless dark forest.

"God Emperor above..."

"It really works."

"Well, she may be annoying, but she's good at the...the...cogboy stuff."

"It really works."

"It's so quiet..."

"Can we replicate this on other ships?"

"Please, be quiet."

That was Kit's voice, a rumble that made you enjoy mashing your face against your pillow. They were all coming from beyond your tent. Mmm. You liked being in a tent. Then memories returned - you were on a tent in a spaceship? Your brow furrowed and you sat up in the quiet darkness, feeling your face bare and shameful. Your mask was just where you reached for it, and when you emerged, wearing your tank top and leggings, you found a cadre of battle brothers, including a tech marine and Aurora, all standing about a makeshift tent pitched in the corner of a vast, glittering room. Silvery machinery, flowing like water, smoothly lifted, loaded and then shifted down to acquire more shells. The batteries themselves were still retracted, but the housings were open and ready to accept their next salvo, while the shells themselves were surrounded by thick armor-steel plates and autoflooding cisterns. Gleaming bulbs of fire suppressing systems and several gleaming terminals were placed here, there.

You saw four...dessciated corpses, withered and fallen on the floor.

"What do we even do with those?" Captain Brutus asked, back turned to the tent - unaware you were peeking out.

"We keep them until we know what the...what did you say they called her?" The Tech-Marine asked.

"Oh, lots of silly things," Amberly said, flicking her hand dismissively. "Warpsmith, Mistress of Gravitics..."

"Well, Herald of a Thousand Stars might be more likely," the Tech-Marine said, nodding. HIs grille covered face was youngish, but his eyes showed a great deal of experience and depth in them. "This auto-loader is remarkable, I don't think the Lex Mechanica have these - or if they do, they don't admit them..."

You stood, brushing your hands off. "Uh...i hope...you don't mind, I got a little...enthusiastic."

"Enthusiastic!?" Captain Brutus asked, turning to face you, laughing and clapping his hand on your shoulder. "Now, use that enthusiasm, what do you want to do with the servitors?"

Your eyes, hidden behind the flat glass of your mask, flicked to them, blinking.
---
Hmm

[ ] Nothing? They're irrelevant to the machinery? Give them a proper recyce?
[ ] The basis of some new murder servitors!
[ ] ...put them in stasis. You're not sure why, yet. But there's gotta be a reason...
[ ] Write In

Health: Fine
Anima: Dim
Willpower: 5/5
Personal Motes: 13/13 | Peripheral Motes: 28/28 (Committed Motes: 5)
Limit: 1/10 (Trigger: Being stymied by indulges around her)
XP: 0 | Solar XP: 0
Major Projects: 0/5
SXP: 11 | GXP: 18 | WXP: 11